Gaza blog made me ‘persona non grata’: ex-Green Party prez

Former Green Party president Paul Estrin, who recently resigned from his position after making controversial comments on the conflict between Israel and Gaza, says he was pushed out of the party in a “brutal” way.

Estrin described his resignation in a post on the Canadian Jewish News website Monday.

In the post, titled ‘Why I’m no longer president of the Green Party of Canada,’ Estrin said he was given no choice other than resignation following his decision to publish a blog post on the party website blaming the ongoing conflict between Israel and Gaza solely on Hamas.

“Unfortunately, those with whom I had worked passionately over the past year and a half informed me I was persona non grata. Despite my work, efforts, achievements — despite all that I have done — because of this one issue I was shown the door, and in a brutal way,” wrote Estrin.

“Those who wanted me out — and let me be clear: it was the large majority of those who control the party — made it as simple as possible. They offered me a choice: An ‘easy’ resignation where I would get to walk away relatively unscathed, or a ‘hard’ resignation that would — well, let’s just say it would have been bad.”

Estrin’s comments in the original blog post, titled “Why Gaza makes me sad,” went strongly against the party’s policy of “engaged neutrality” on the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. The blog post led Green Party Leader Elizabeth May to distance herself from Estrin’s opinions, stating that the party does not share his views.

Many Green party members expressed distaste with Estrin’s position in the comments section of the blog post before it was removed. For instance, one commenter, identified as Alex Hill, said they were “never expecting to hear such propaganda” while another named Colette Belanger was so “shocked, disheartened and disappointed” with Estrin’s position that she asked for her membership to be rescinded.

In the Canadian Jewish News post Monday, Estrin stood by his comments.

“My comments were moderate in nature,” wrote Estrin. “Sadly, my moderate article criticizing a violent terrorist group could not be tolerated by a majority of the party membership.”

The blog post eventually was removed from the Green Party website for what the party called “governance” reasons. According to Green Party Director of Communications Julian Morelli, Estrin’s opinion confused party members on the party’s policy towards Israel and the Palestinian Territories and misled members because Estrin originally posted it as party president.

Estrin criticized the party’s decision to remove the blog post Monday, adding that there is “apparently no room within the party for dialogue.” He also expressed concern about threats to his personal safety made by some online commenters.

Last week, Estrin resigned as president following a conference call with the party executive, including May. Despite Estrin’s version of events, Morelli maintained that the resignation conversation was respectful. Morelli refused to comment further, saying that the conversation was private.

In his post Monday, Estrin wrote that he initially planned to fight for his right to continue as party president, his right to express himself and “have an opinion that diverges from other members.” But he ultimately decided to resign and avoid the “hard” resignation.

“The resignation was a very difficult decision for me. Just the idea of leaving, stepping away from something that I had worked so hard for, profoundly disturbs me,” wrote Estrin.

For Estrin, his forced resignation speaks to larger freedom-of-speech and diversity issues within the party.

“For a party that speaks about welcoming diversity, of persons and opinions, and proudly states that it does not employ a party whip to ensure uniformity — for a party that affirms the right of party members to have a voice — it just doesn’t add up,” wrote Estrin.

Estrin, Jewish himself, said he plans to continue to stand up for the environmental and human rights issues championed by the Greens, while at the same time supporting Israel.

“Despite this unfortunate episode, I still believe one can be concerned about the environment and human rights and at the same time support the state of Israel. In my mind, that hasn’t changed. What has changed is I am now convinced one simply can’t do so within the confines of the Green Party of Canada.”

The controversy comes as all federal parties’ face scrutiny over their positions on the Israel-Hamas conflict. The Conservatives have asked donors to show their support by standing with the Conservatives as they “stand with Israel” and have accused Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau of not supporting Israel.

The Liberals, on the other hand, have said they don’t want to make the conflict a partisan issue. The NDP, which traditionally has supported the Palestinian side of the conflict, has been more equivocal on the crisis, expressing concern about civilians being killed in Gaza while emphasizing Israel’s right to defend itself against Hamas.

Stop with the whining Mr. Estrin, you decided to over-ride the Green Party”s position on the ongoing situation between Israel and Palestine. I for one will be taking a serious look at the Green Party in the run up to the next Federal election or does that make me anti-semitic. Ms May is the leader of the Greens and you Mr Estrin purposely tried to undermine her leadership thru a media press release.

Sir, brutal is the way the racist zionist state has been treating Palestinians for decades, long before Hamas. You a simply a zioinist apologist with all due respect sir. By the way Palestinians are Semites; settlers from Europe and US not so much.

Mr Estrin’s position makes absolutely no sense. He was a senior official in a political organization that had a clearly defined policy regarding the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. Mr Estrin knew that party policy when he became a senior official. Mr Estrin purposely undermined the party policy because of his own personal opinion and it is easy to claim that his opinion is biased solely on his religious affiliation. In Canada most politicians try to keep their religious affiliations separate from their political activity. It would certainly be within his right to advocate for Israel as an ordinary Green Party member, but not when he holds the position of party president. The fact that he can’t see that is an indication of his unsuitability for any political office. In the process of damaging the Green Party he has inadvertently exposed the possibility that the Jewish religious community is forcing its adherents to support Israel in spite of reservations they may have about the government of Israel’s behavior. Sad state of affairs.

Does Mr. Estrin not understand that an occupied people have the legal right to defend themselves? Apparently not. Israel destroys, imprisons and humiliates Palestinian people. They capture Palestinian children, interrogate them, threaten them to obtain information. There is no defending the indefensible. This is not about religion; it is about ethnic cleansing and occupation. Israel is the 4th largest military power with nuclear capabilities, they are the agressor against a people with no airport, seaport, military, navy who cannot leave an open air prison; the Palestians in the West Bank are also brutally controlled on their occupied lands with illegal settlements. Water in the West Bank is diverted from Palestinian bantuized communities with the majority going to illegal jewish only settlements.
Nice try Mr. Estrin.

Mr. Estrin should be informed that at 4:37 am Gaza time, zionist terrorists began shelling and naval fire towards Gaza. Another ceasefire broken by zios against the real people who have the right to defend themselves under brutal occupation which will undoubtedly not be reported by MSM. (10:30 pm Aug 12/14)

The significance of the words Apartheid and Holocaust have been greatly tarnished because of Muslims and their left-wing prostitutes using these words so loosely and so carelessly worldwide. So why is Israel an apartheid state? Because it has parliament members who are Arabs/Muslims? It has judges who are Arabs/Muslims? It has servicemen who are Arabs/Muslim? It had a Miss Israel winner who was Arab and Muslim? If that’s what you mean by apartheid then it could be apartheid in a parallel universe but not on earth. Last time I checked, building security walls between two separate countries isn’t apartheid, building partition walls inside your own country is.

If an armed conflict between two belligerents (Hamas and IDF) and the casualties as a result of that is Holocaust then I guess we need to find a better term for the one-sided genocide of Christians, Yazidis and Shias in Nigeria, Syria and Iraq as well as the actual Holocaust Hitler committed on the Jewish people by putting them inside gas-chambers and ovens. It’s pathetic to even imagine that Muslims can stoop so low by abusing historically sensitive terms to score some cheap religious and political points. Yikes! I guess what’s “low” for the rest of humanity is just “normal” for Muslims and their left-wing slaves.

PS I’m an atheist so don’t you leftist-Jihadists dare call me a Christian or Jewish fundamentalist as you mentally autistic cretins usually do to anyone who challenges your deranged worldviews!